A special Pune court today granted bail to Bank of Maharashtra's Managing Director and CEO Ravindra Marathe in a cheating case involving city-based real estate developer D S Kulkarni and his wife, among others. Judge S N Sardesai of the special court set up under the Maharashtra Protection Of Interest Of Depositors Act granted the relief to Marathe on a surety bond of Rs.50,000.

The chief executive of state-run Bank of Maharashtra sanctioned a 100 million rupee ($1.5 million) loan to a real estate firm which had defaulted on payments to investors, according to a court document on the latest probe into loan fraud at Indian banks. Police arrested the banks chief executive Ravindra Marathe, executive director Rajendra Gupta and a former chairman.